


RE: Foie Gras

by redpandawriter



Series: Interpret the Evidence [2]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game), Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Case Fic, Creative liberties taken in how sentient androids process trauma, Deviant Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Gen, POV Connor, People stare at each other a lot: the fic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-23
Updated: 2020-09-23
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:41:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26608444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redpandawriter/pseuds/redpandawriter
Summary: Connor could see a flashing alert in the corner of his vision, advising him to contact Cyberlife about the instability in his software. A gaudy, and obtrusive thing he found to be annoying at best and painfully distracting at worst. Sometimes if he stared at it long enough the red would start to darken and begin to drip. The android would hear a faint splash and look down-“So, Connor, tell me about Will Graham.”-and he would be in that kitchen, watching Will try and fail to stop Abigail’s bleeding. Watching as the man’s expression grew more panicked, his actions become more panicked.Life goes on, Connor tries to keep up.
Series: Interpret the Evidence [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1935808
Comments: 3
Kudos: 19





	RE: Foie Gras

**Author's Note:**

> Me, coming in two years later with a Starbucks macchiato: what up sluts, guess who completely forgot about this series until a comment reminded me of it
> 
> Haaah, anyway here's chapter 1 for part 2 of the series, hope you enjoy it!

The world around him slowly melted away as the static grew in his ears, distantly he could hear the sirens of ambulances and police cars dull themselves. The blood of Abigail Hobbs still warm against his hands and his face as he sees her struggle on the kitchen floor to breathe. He tries to stop it, stop the bleeding, his hands staining red, but her panic is becoming his panic and there’s just so much blood-

“Connor?”

He blinks, abruptly returning to the present, sitting alone in the study of his house in a crisp clean suit facing a computer screen, “I’m sorry, Amanda, what was the question?”

She tilts her head. “Androids are much more likely to go deviant after experiencing a great emotional shock. The FBI have their reasons to keep the details of what happened during that case confidential, at least, up until it concerns you.”

Connor stared at the screen, no longer a screen but a photographer’s darkroom, at Amanda, no longer her but the dead eyed corpse of Garret Jacob Hobbs, as she continues to speak, “Connor, is everything alright?”

Without missing a beat, he answers, “Yes.”

  
  


Connor sat in the backseat of Jack Crawford’s car behind the driver’s seat, watching Will as he slept against the window. He couldn’t imagine that it was comfortable, but he had read an article discussing the comfort brought on by repetitive and rhythmic motion of a moving car, so there was undoubtedly more to it than Connor was capable of perceiving. 

For a moment he couldn’t help but wonder what it was like for humans to sleep, and if it was anything like it was for androids, brief blackouts with no sense of time moving forward, just a smash cut to the next scene. Maybe he should ask Will about it sometime later, as right now they had a crime scene to scour.

He leaned forward and gently tapped on the man’s shoulder, who awakes with a small start, “We’re here,” he says.

They step out of the car as the wind picks up and tosses around dead leaves. Before them stands a cabin adorned with some animal skulls. The cabin where Garret Jacob Hobbs committed his murders.

It wasn’t very picturesque inside, it brought more to mind the sense of a workshop than a vacation retreat. Which, in fairness, was how Hobbs used the cabin, the studio reflects the soul of an artist, as Will said in a lecture once. Though now the entire place has evidence tags on it. Connor wondered what that could mean symbolically.

They took to the upstairs, Will, Jack, and himself, and found themselves in an attic whose walls were adorned with antlers. Its centerpiece, a set from a mature stag, the tips covered in dried blood. This is where he must have drained them.

He glances at Will, trailing just a little ways behind him, whose reaction he can’t discern, who is staring at the cage of bones surrounding them. He focuses on the centerpiece, quietly approaching it before speaking, “Could be a permanent installation in your Evil Minds museum.”

“What we learn from Garret Jacob Hobbs,” Jack begins, “will help us catch the next Garret Jacob Hobbs. We still have seven bodies unaccounted for.”

“That’s because he ate them.”

“Had to be parts he couldn’t eat.”

“That doesn’t mean he couldn’t still use them,” Connor interjected. Jack turned to him and suddenly the idea of listing all the ways Hobbs could have repurposed parts of a human body he couldn’t consume felt like a wrong one.

Still staring at him, Jack continued, “What if Hobbs wasn’t eating alone. I mean,” he slowly turned to Will, “it must have been a lot of work, getting these girls, bringing them here to butcher and god knows what else.”

Will looked thoughtful, “You think he hunted with someone?”

Jack nodded, “Someone in a coma.”

Connor reflexively looks down to see Abigail Hobbs struggling to breathe and covered in her own blood.

“Abigail Hobbs is a suspect?” Will’s disbelief feels like a mirror to his own.

“We’ve been conducting house to house interviews around the Hobbs residence and this property.”

“And the gossip?”

“Hobbs and his daughter spent a lot of time together, time here at this cabin, and she would be the ideal bait, wouldn’t she?”

Will looked distinctly annoyed- no angry? upset?- at Jack’s proposal, “Hobbs killed alone.” He says this with a firm conviction that Connor can’t feel himself.

Jack says nothing as he continues to look around the room.

It’s then Connor picks up something on his scan of the room, “Will, take a look at that,” he says, pointing towards a corner of the antler room.

Will gives him a look he doesn't understand as he approaches the spot where he pointed, taking tweezers out of his pocket and reaching over to pick up a long, red hair off the ground, “Someone else was here.”

* * *

Will blamed their success in finding the Minnesota Shrike on bad book keeping and dumb luck.

It was funny to Connor that he included the android, as he didn’t do much outside of identifying a dead body faster and look up an address but apparently that was enough in the human’s eyes.

The lecture itself was interesting, Will certainly had a flair for the dramatics with his wholly theatrical presentation, though perhaps that had to do with the brought on topic of the Copycat. He hadn’t forgotten about Cassie Boyle, but that incident felt like ages ago and not just a few days past. Where had his sense of time gone?

As the lecture ends and the dismissed trainees file out of the classroom, Connor rises out of his seat and begins to descend the steps to greet Will. Though it turns out he’s not the only one moving to see him, as from the crowd of trainees a woman emerges and approaches Will. A scan identifies her as Dr. Alana Bloom, a psychologist employed by the FBI.

Despite Will avoiding all eye contact, he seems to immediately sense Alana’s arrival. “Hi,” he says.

She smiles at him, “Hey, how are you?”

Will also smiles, but there’s something off about it, “I have no idea.”

It dawns on Connor that neither of them realize he’s here still standing near the desks situated in the back of the classroom, and that now would likely be as good a time as any to draw attention to himself. So he continues down the steps, and as he does Alana and Will both glance at the movement they noticed out the corner of their eye.

“Hi, there,” the doctor speaks first, her expression curious.

“Ah, Dr. Bloom, this is Connor. Connor, Dr. Bloom.”

“A pleasure to make your acquaintance,” he reaches out to shake her hand, she accepts after a moment, her grip is gentle.

“So you must be the android I keep hearing from everyone, how’s Will been treating you?”

Connor glances at Will, whose expression he recognizes as one of curiosity. The android looks back to Alana, “Better than most people at this facility.”

Will snorts at that, Alana accepts that answer and turns back to the other man, “So, I didn’t want you to be ambushed-”

“Is this an ambush?” The mirth from his face disappears.

“When Jack gets here, consider yourself ambushed.”

Right on cue Jack Crawford appears. “How’s class?” he asks approaching the desk Will stands behind.

“They applauded,” Will responds, “It was inappropriate.”

“Review board begs to differ, you’re up for commendation and they okayed active return to the field.”

“That is,” Alana adds, “Do you want to go back in the field.”

Before Will can answer that, Jack continues, “I want you out on the field, but I told the board that I’m recommending a Psych Evaluation.”

Will looks at Alana, who looks at Will sympathetically. “Are we starting now?”

The doctor shakes her head, “Session wouldn’t be with me.”

“Hannibal Lecter,” Jack says, “Would be a better fit. Your relationship is less personal, but if you feel more comfortable with Dr. Bloom-”

“I’m not going to feel comfortable with anyone going through my head.”

“Will, you’ve never killed anyone before, it’s a deadly force that’s a lot to digest,” Alana presses.

“I’ve worked homicide before, I’ve got a good metabolism.” Will says.

“Reason you currently ‘used to’ work is you couldn’t stomach pulling the trigger.” Jack responds, “You just pulled the trigger ten times.”

An expression Connor recognized as confusion crossed Will’s face, “Psych Eval’s not a formality?”

“No it’s so I can sleep at night. I asked you to get close to Hobbs and I need to know that you didn’t get too close. How many times have you spent the night in Abigail Hobbs’ hospital room?”

Connor suddenly wished he had any reason to be anywhere but here at the moment. Will seemed to share that sentiment, “Therapy doesn’t work on me.”

“Why not just have a conversation with Hannibal.” Alana says, her tone is soothing, “He was there. He knows what you went through.”

Will still didn’t look enthused, as he picked up his things and proceeded to walk out of the classroom. Connor followed him, desperately wanting to be anywhere else but with those two and risk being interrogated himself.

That and Connor needed something from Will.

“Mr. Graham.”

Will begrudgingly turned around, “Is it your turn, now, to convince me to go to therapy?”

Connor shook his head, “No, I was hoping to ask you for a personal favor, if that’s alright with you.”

Will stared at the android, for a few moments he said nothing, then “What’s the favor?”

Strangely, Connor could feel his systems heat up slightly, making him breathe just a little faster. Will continued to stare, as Connor answered, “I can’t ask my handler’s for permission to visit Abigail Hobbs, they would deem it unnecessary and possibly hold it against me as a sign of deviancy-”

“Are you?”

Connor blinked, “Am I what?”

“Deviant, are you deviant?” The look of curiosity on Will’s face was very clear, but it felt much different than when Hannibal Lecter looked at him with the same expression. It was… a more welcome look on the special investigator than on the doctor’s.

Still, the question felt too loaded for Connor to not feel like he got himself cornered. “That would go against my programming as a deviant android hunter, Mr. Graham.”

Will evenly held his gaze, “And killing someone would go against my profession of catching killers.”

“That’s different.”

“Is it?”

“Within the context of when you shot Garret Jacob Hobbs, that was in the defense of Abigail Hobbs-”

“Do you really think that matters?”

For a beat, Connor was silent, now his turn to stare at Will, before answering, “It does to me.”

* * *

Connor was well aware that Will self identified as somewhere on the autistic spectrum, which is what led to Connor cataloging several expressions that often cross Will’s face. For the most part, it didn’t really help in their conversations, there was no talking Will down unless you wanted to further piss him off. Any appeal to logic had to come from a credible source that he had an emotional investment in. Connor wasn’t something Will had an emotional investment in, at least not yet.

It’s this sense of unpredictability that keeps leaving Connor feeling like he was trying to corral a wild buck, as opposed to dealing with an agent of the FBI. Perhaps this eccentricity is just par for the course when working in such a high stress environment, but so far as of yet, Connor only has Will, Alana, and Jack as frame of reference and it still feels too soon to offer up his amateur diagnosis.

The android had considered the merits of reading up on autism, but knowing the man was self diagnosed it was probably for the best that Connor didn’t, at least until there was an official diagnosis.

* * *

“Tell me about yourself.” Dr. Hannibal Lecter began sitting from a chic leather-bound chair.

His office was quite the character in it of itself, the cool and muted colors blended well with the amount of care for detail. The first floor was home to the seating area, desk, a fireplace, and some other decorations. The second floor was an open walkway adorned with bookshelves, housing dozens of academic texts.

It gave Connor an aesthetically clinical appeal. 

_ The studio reflects the soul of the artist. _

“My name is Connor, version 800 of the RK series. I was designed by Cyberlife to study deviancy, and was given to the FBI as a gesture of good faith. As of the present, my second directive is to assist and protect Will Graham.” 

As Connor said this, he found himself impressed with Hannibal’s ability to maintain constant eye contact. It was so unlike what the android was used to, as Will was quick to break it off unless he had a point to make.

The doctor didn’t smile, but he was regardless able to give off an amused reaction. “A very well presented introduction, it gives a sense of professionalism and impersonality. Fitting.” Hannibal paused, his eyes studying Connor intensely, before continuing. “Tell me about Will.”

The android tilted his head slightly right, his eyebrows narrowing slightly, “I assume you have spoken to him in his respective sessions, you more than likely know Will better than I.”

It didn’t come out aggressive, or so Connor was inclined to believe, he was confident his tone was even. Even still, the look Hannibal gave him was disconcerting. 

“Humans are a social species,” the doctor began after a beat, “it is how we have come to perch ourselves at the top of the food chain. Evolved to the point of surpassing all other predators, to become the apex. Going so far as to make friends out of some of them, even as far as to create an entirely new species using ourselves as the blueprint.”

Strange, hadn’t this man written an article on social exclusion?

“So even if you are correct, you shouldn’t discredit your own perspective on what is happening to you, simply because you are made using different materials. In the end we are all made of the same things, just in varying amounts.”

Connor could see a flashing alert in the corner of his vision, advising him to contact Cyberlife about the instability in his software. A gaudy, and obtrusive thing he found to be annoying at best and painfully distracting at worst. Sometimes if he stared at it long enough the red would start to darken and begin to drip. The android would hear a faint splash and look down-

“So, Connor, tell me about Will Graham.”

-and he would be in that kitchen, watching Will try and fail to stop Abigail’s bleeding. Watching as the man’s expression grew more panicked, his actions become more panicked. 

Then Connor would hear a faint beep, and was back in the present.

“...Will Graham, has inspired a curiosity within me.”

There was a sense of shock that Connor could see in Hannibal's microexpressions. He made a note of it.

“He can solve crimes with an efficiency I don’t have, in due thanks to his unique capacity to empathize with anyone including those of a less stable mind. He does so effortlessly, and yet this same ability also makes him uncomfortable. If not for his own sense of justice, I doubt he’d use it at all.”

Connor felt oddly overwhelmed, a few more alerts notified him of rising stress levels and more of software instability. He wasn’t anywhere near the typical level of self-destructive deviancy, but he was finding it necessary to breathe more deeply to keep his systems cool.

“But he does,” says Hannibal, eyes shining an emotion Connor didn’t recognize, “because it helps save lives.” 

The android shook his head, “Empathy isn’t sympathy, and Will doesn’t like to give anymore than he has to.”

“What is the difference to you? Between empathy and sympathy?”

“The difference-” is that one has you feeling the  _ same  _ as another, while the other has you feeling  _ for  _ another, but no, that isn’t what he wants to hear, “The difference is that one is embodied in Will.”

“And the other?”

There was a pause, “I should think that the other is embodied more in a man like Hobbs.”

“Do you know why you think so?”

There was another, longer pause before Connor answered. Hannibal didn’t seem to mind but his stoic expression gave virtually nothing away. “All throughout the investigation Will kept emphasis on how much Hobbs loved each of his victims, even before we found the body of Elise Nichols he said that each girl taken was to hide how special the one true intended victim was.”

“You refer to Abigail Hobbs.”

He pauses, then, “...Yes.” 

“You refer to Abigail, but in what relation to them? Will and Hobbs?”

In what relation, indeed. Connor paused for yet another moment, trying to organize his thoughts into something verbally coherent, “Hobbs only knew what he felt, why he had to kill those girls, how love could become the overwhelming need to take their life. Will knows Hobbs’s feelings. Both the why and the how. Maybe not in exact detail, but it’s more than anyone else… 

“I- huh. I’m not used to,” he shifted slightly in his chair, across the intense gaze of Hannibal, there was a sudden onslaught of what must be embarrassment, “to talking so much, hardly ever do the FBI ask me anything much less such open ended questions.”

That got a smirk of amusement from the doctor, “What is therapy, if not a medium to get someone talking?”

Connor was certain that was meant to be a charming joke. Shame he didn’t even feel like faking a laugh.

* * *

It was five fifty-two on a Saturday evening when they got a call to check another crime scene.

There weren’t any words to describe how unsettling the whole scene looked, save maybe ‘straight from a creative horror set’. If only that were so.

Several graves, all dug adjacently to each other, had an exposed arm from underneath them, iv’s attached to them reached into whatever was contained within the burlap sack. In on the bodies themselves was growing a fungus Connor identified as Pleurotus Nidiformis.

There is something morbidly charming in the array of colors the mushrooms give in contrast to the deathly white of the corpses. He imagined the scene before him would have translated very nicely into a watercolor painting.

“What do you see?” Will speaks, suddenly breaking the pattern of his thoughts, “What does the latest in artificial investigative intelligence truly capable of?”

The android takes a step back, turning his head to take in a panoramic glance of the scene before him.

“The fungus seems to have spread into the surface of the surrounding area, he buried them shallow to allow as such.” His gaze lingered on one of the uncovered bodies, watching as one of the forensics peel the rotting flesh off one of the victims faces, another pulling at ivs and catheters, and one taking samples of the surrounding dirt. “He kept them alive, induced comas somehow. The compost must be rich in nutrients to be able to support this strain of mycelium.”

He can see Will nodding out his periphery, “A very logical set of conclusions. Sensible.” 

“I am an android.”

He snorts at that. “Indeed you are.” and walks toward the graves.

Connor watches him tread forward without hesitation, the android timing each step in accordance to the ticking of a clock. The slight hitch in his breathing as he kneels before the one of the graves, a victim unearthed but not yet extracted lies motionless beneath Will’s vacant stare. Its skin adorned with fungus like the way one adornes a tree with ornaments. Except that’s not it. Whoever was doing this was working far too coldly for a such a warm comparison. 

Perhaps therein lied the issue. Connor could only understand the human mind from a chemical standpoint, such as the general knowledge to explain how the stress of the mind causes the tears that spill from one’s eyes to have different structures. All that simply meaning the tears you cry out of sadness are not the same as the ones you cry out of joy, and that this release is considered healthy.

The seconds tick by and Will hasn’t moved, aside from a shaky intake of breath- and suddenly a hand from the man lying in the grave reaches out to snatch Will’s, “He’s still alive!”he calls out as the other coughs harsh and wet.

* * *

The man didn’t live. He died on the way to the hospital.

Connor stares at his body, sitting in the cold and clean examination table in the forensics lab, standing in the far corner of the room. Everyone gathered in the room is wearing gloves, aprons, and splash shields, all surrounding the body on the table.

“Like he’s been soaking in glucose,” Brian Zeller says, gesturing vaguely towards the body.

“What exactly has he been soaking in?” Connor asks.

“A highly concentrated mixture of hardwoods, shredded newspaper, and pig poop. Perfect for growing mushrooms and other fungi.” Jimmy Price responds. Though it was not Connor’s first visit to the lab and far from his first encounter with the Price and Zeller pair, there was still something unusually cheerful about their attitudes that the android couldn’t get used to.

“Surprise though, it wasn’t the mushrooms that killed them. It was kidney failure.” Brian added, covering the victim with a sheet.

At the sound of the door opening Connor looks up to see Beverly Katz walk in with a handful of I.V. bags, “Dextrose in all the catheters. He probably used some kind of dialysis or peristaltic to pump fluids after the circulatory systems broke down.”

“He force-fed them sugar water,” Will says.

“You know who loves sugar water? Mushrooms. They crave that stuff, or as much as a mushroom can crave anything.” Jimmy says.

“Recovering alcoholics crave sugar.” Brian adds, then glancing at Jimmy, “No offense.”

“I’m not recovering,” he replies, his expression sharp.

“So is someone preying on recovering alcoholics?” Beverly interjects, glancing at Will.

“Alcoholics aren’t the only ones with compromised endocrine systems,” he begins, “They died of kidney failure, death of diabetic ketoacidosis?”

Beverly looks at Brian, “Did we know they were diabetics?”

He meets her gaze evenly, “We don’t know they’re diabetics.”

“They’re all diabetics,” Will says. “He’s induces a coma, then buries them.”

“That means he has access to their medication.” Connor adds. 

“He’s working as a physician, a pharmacist, or somewhere in the medical fields,” Will adds, now removing the lab get up and making towards the door.

Once he leaves the remaining three humans turn to stare at him. Connor stares back, “Is there something wrong?”

They all glanced at each other, briefly, before Brian spoke, “Aren’t you going to follow Will?”

Connor shakes his head, “He requested I don’t disturb him during his free period, so he may put sole focus on preparing his next lecture.”

“So,” Beverly begins, looking especially curious, “What are you going to do now?”

“Return to the charging station that Cyberlife provided the FBI.”

“Wow, you’re like a walking advertisement for them, aren’t you?” Brian says, more than asks.

He gets back to work at Jimmy’s insistence, but Beverly keeps her gaze focused on him, her eyes searching for something Connor doesn’t know if she’ll find, before returning to work herself.

* * *

The hospital reminds Connor of the Cyberlife building. From it’s pristine white walls to the clinical professionalism of the employees. Abigail’s room, in particular, brings back the fractured and grainy videos stored in the furthest reaches of his memory of the process being built by Elijah Kamski.

There are no emotions tied to them, but there they remain, as he watches Will pull up a chair to sit next to Abigail and hold her hand. The look on his face makes Connor think of the look Elijah would give him. He doesn’t quite understand what they mean, but the peace of quiet is too fragile for Connor to want to break.

Hours pass, though to the android it feels barely like minutes, and Will lays awkwardly on a couch, eyes closed in sleep. Connor himself sits in the chair Will had just been using earlier.

The entire experience is uneventful, which puzzles him, seeing as Abigail has been the focus of his recent hallucinations. Although seeing her laying on the bed looking almost as pale as the sheets, the rhythmic beeping of the heart monitor, and the subtle rise and fall of her chest are enough to ground Connor to the reality of the situation. The big picture, as it were, was that Abigail was in a coma, recovering from the laceration in her neck.

Abigail Hobbs is alive, and she is safe. For the moment.

**Author's Note:**

> Follow me on tumblr @red-panda-types!


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